sion of the Chichimecs was signal, and the missions they founded in the Sierra Gorda had more effect in reducing them to submission than the steel and gunpowder of the military. In time, however, the missions became secularized, and in 1785 only two out of the twenty established remained under the control of the friars, namely San Miguel de las Palmas, administered by the Dominicans, and Concepcion Soriano, or Bucareli, by the barefooted friars of San Diego.[1]
Although the Indians of Sierra Gorda were occasionally troublesome during the eighteenth century, their insubordination did not interfere with the growth of the city or the development of industrial interests. In the architectural beauty of its churches, religious establishments, and public buildings, Querétaro is equal to any city in Mexico, except the capital. In, 1796 it had 272 streets with twenty-one public fountains and six plazas. Its length from east to west at this date was nearly two miles and three quarters, and its width from north to south over one mile and a quarter.[2] The water supply of Querétaro, obtained at a distance of two leagues, is conveyed into the city by its celebrated aqueduct, a structure of singular solidity and architectural beauty. The arches are supported on seventy-two pillars of hewn stone, eighteen varas apart, and twenty-seven varas high. The work was begun in January 1726, and completed in October 1735, at an expense of $124,800, $82,000 of which were donated by Juan Antonio Urrutia y Arana, marqués del Villar de la Aguila.[3] But the pride of the place is La Cañada, a beautiful glen penetrating for two leagues the mountains which surround the city, and affording views of such exquisite loveliness that no city in the
- ↑ Pinart, Col. Doc. Mex., MS., 271-3, 457-8. In 1740 the number of missions was 17, ten of which were founded by Franciscans and seven by Dominicans. Orozco y Berra, Carta Etnog., 260-1; Arricivita, Cron. Scrdf., 16971; Sigüenza y Góngara, Carta al Almir, MS., 10-11.
- ↑ Querétaro, Ordenanza qué para la Division.
- ↑ For an account of the festivities held in celebration of the completion of the aqueduct see Navarrete, Relac. Peregrin., no. i. 63-163.
